As with my quarterly improvisation recordings, I thought it would be a good idea to keep an ongoing journal of my double tonguing progress. Be sure to read the fast articulation journal to understand my reasons and goals for this project.

FEBRUARY 22, 2004

All exercises are on Clarke's technical study #2.

- Single-tongued. This is as fast as I can articulate with a single-tongued attack.

- Double-tongued, with a standard 'tu-ku' attack.

- Slow double tongue, with a smoothed 'du-gu' attack.

- Slow attacks using ONLY a 'gu' attack.

If I hope to succeed with double tonguing in an improvised jazz solo, I think I'll need to do two main things: (1) smooth my double tongue into a 'du-gu' style of attack, and (2) reach a point where I can use double tonguing interchangeably with single tonguing.

The second point is important because I want the double-tongued passages to blend in seamlessly with the rest of the improvised solo. If I have to consciously think about starting on a particular syllable or beat, then I feel like the double-tongued passage will stick out like a sore thumb. It might sound *fancy*, but it probably won't sound good from a musical perspective. With this in mind, I recorded the 'gu'-only track. It's an experiment to break traditional tonguing habits. I have no idea whether or not it will help, but I figure it's worth trying.